LEPROSY. Some years ago
we
drew the attention of
prevalent opinions held by the garding leprosy, and the reasons
our
readers to the
natives of this "which inclined
country
us
re-
in common
?with them to believe that this disease was, under certain circumstances, communicable and hereditary, but hardly induced
by
a
fish diet.
arrived at
Our conclusions were at variance with those
committee of the College of Physicians, but study of their report, we are hardly surprised to find that the original question has been re-opened, and that Dr, Gavin Milroy has discovered that nearly half of the medical practitioners of Demerara hold with us that leprosy is more or after
a
by
a
careful
less communicable. Mr. Jonathan Hutchinson rather inclines to the notion, also entertained by many natives of this country, that leprosy is induced through means of a fish diet, his conclusion having been formed
from
a
study
of the disease as it exists at the
of certain towns on the among the inhabitants can be little there and of coast doubt, as the editor of Norway ; remarks in his issue of the 27th of January, that the
present day
Englishman
in many fish-eating communities in various parts of the world, notably in this country along the Malabar and Coromandel
coasts, leprosy is very prevalent.
In fact
"
down the whole
THE INDIAN MEDICAL GAZETTE.
68
India, from Orissa to Cape Comorin and northwards again Gujcrat, the maritime population seems to be peculiarly subject to leprosy, and one of the first objects of public charity in a seaboard town is a Leper Hospital." There can be no possible doubt as to the accuracy of this fact, nevertheless Dr. Day observes in the Indian Medical Gazette for February 1871, in discussing the influence of a fish diet as a cause of leprosy,?" we find the Burmese race, who are most assuredly a fish-consuming one, and who like their odoriferous nga pee far better than fresh fish, yet I never saw an instance of leprosy coast of
to
among them, while it is classes who do not eat fish,
in India among the inland it is among those who consume it."
as common as
Arguments of this kind bave always seemed to us to weigh against theory of leprosy, and Dr. Shearer in the Edinburgh Medical Journal for January, from a study of the disease among the Chinese, has arrived at much the same conclusion; nevertheless he attributes lepi'osy to a " morbid condition of the blood determined by breathing the impure air of certain malarious districts; leprotic deposit with all its consequences is the result." If this were the case it is difficult to understand why the Burmese should escape leprosy, and still more the inhabitants of the Andaman islands, while people living in less malarious places in India escape the disease. It seems to us that a malarious diathesis may predispose those subjected to its influence to leprosy, but malaria can hardly be sufficient to account for the dvelopement of the disease, nor can we by any such theory understand the circumstances of leprosy as detailed by Dr. the fish
Hillebrand at page 131 of the Indian Medical Gazette for 1866; in this
history
we
have the details of the
development
and
progress of the disease among the inhabitants of the Sandwich islands. The climate of these islands is as fine as any in the world, the people are well off, and yet within seventeen years
leprosy has invaded almost been absolutely unknown advise
those desirous of
every district of the there prior to 1848.
island, having We strongly opinion regarding the
forming an question to study Dr. Ilillebrand's report: we believe unique and it contains one of the most instructive
disease in it to be
histories of this disease
we
have ever met with.
[Maech 1,
1872.
we
drew the attention of
prevalent opinions held by the garding leprosy, and the reasons
our
readers to the
natives of this "which inclined
country
us
re-
in common
?with them to believe that this disease was, under certain circumstances, communicable and hereditary, but hardly induced
by
a
fish diet.
arrived at
Our conclusions were at variance with those
committee of the College of Physicians, but study of their report, we are hardly surprised to find that the original question has been re-opened, and that Dr, Gavin Milroy has discovered that nearly half of the medical practitioners of Demerara hold with us that leprosy is more or after
a
by
a
careful
less communicable. Mr. Jonathan Hutchinson rather inclines to the notion, also entertained by many natives of this country, that leprosy is induced through means of a fish diet, his conclusion having been formed
from
a
study
of the disease as it exists at the
of certain towns on the among the inhabitants can be little there and of coast doubt, as the editor of Norway ; remarks in his issue of the 27th of January, that the
present day
Englishman
in many fish-eating communities in various parts of the world, notably in this country along the Malabar and Coromandel
coasts, leprosy is very prevalent.
In fact
"
down the whole
THE INDIAN MEDICAL GAZETTE.
68
India, from Orissa to Cape Comorin and northwards again Gujcrat, the maritime population seems to be peculiarly subject to leprosy, and one of the first objects of public charity in a seaboard town is a Leper Hospital." There can be no possible doubt as to the accuracy of this fact, nevertheless Dr. Day observes in the Indian Medical Gazette for February 1871, in discussing the influence of a fish diet as a cause of leprosy,?" we find the Burmese race, who are most assuredly a fish-consuming one, and who like their odoriferous nga pee far better than fresh fish, yet I never saw an instance of leprosy coast of
to
among them, while it is classes who do not eat fish,
in India among the inland it is among those who consume it."
as common as
Arguments of this kind bave always seemed to us to weigh against theory of leprosy, and Dr. Shearer in the Edinburgh Medical Journal for January, from a study of the disease among the Chinese, has arrived at much the same conclusion; nevertheless he attributes lepi'osy to a " morbid condition of the blood determined by breathing the impure air of certain malarious districts; leprotic deposit with all its consequences is the result." If this were the case it is difficult to understand why the Burmese should escape leprosy, and still more the inhabitants of the Andaman islands, while people living in less malarious places in India escape the disease. It seems to us that a malarious diathesis may predispose those subjected to its influence to leprosy, but malaria can hardly be sufficient to account for the dvelopement of the disease, nor can we by any such theory understand the circumstances of leprosy as detailed by Dr. the fish
Hillebrand at page 131 of the Indian Medical Gazette for 1866; in this
history
we
have the details of the
development
and
progress of the disease among the inhabitants of the Sandwich islands. The climate of these islands is as fine as any in the world, the people are well off, and yet within seventeen years
leprosy has invaded almost been absolutely unknown advise
those desirous of
every district of the there prior to 1848.
island, having We strongly opinion regarding the
forming an question to study Dr. Ilillebrand's report: we believe unique and it contains one of the most instructive
disease in it to be
histories of this disease
we
have ever met with.
[Maech 1,
1872.
